Attempting the challenging - growing decent wine grapes in the heart of the Puget Sound AVA - in Puyallup, Washington. Cool, wet, short summers. We'll see how it goes. (You can click on any photo to get a higher-resolution version.)

Raven's Call

Haida Raven

Sunday, November 7, 2010

End of the season

Dark and rainy in the morning, dark and rainy in the evening. Definitely the end of the 2010 grape season. The Madeleine Angevine has been racked twice, fined with Kielesol and chitosan, and I decided to oak it with medium toast French Oak. It has cleared very nicely.

5 Gallons of Madeleine Angevine

We had a very heavy rain last night and it pretty well stripped all the leaves off all the grapevines.

Raven's Call Vineyard Nov-2020

I am leaving the few clusters on the individual plants that did not have enough fruit to pick and ferment. I'm trying to better understand how long the fruit can hang in this cold rainy climate before it splits and rots, or if it will still get higher sugar content. The Pinot Blanc started splitting in the rain, even though the Brix is not that high (individual berries today tested at about 14 Brix..).

Pinot Blanc Nov-10

The grafted Zweigelt-rebe also seems to have thin skins - many berries are splitting.

Zweigelt-rebe

The grape that is surprising me is the Pinot Noir. They just keep hanging in there - no splitting, no rot. They are beautiful.

Pinot Noir07-Nov-10

Pinot Noir

Pinot Noir

The problem is... they are not developing any higher sugar content. The Brix is still testing right around 17. Not great, but apparently with temperatures in the 50 to 60's for highs, they are simply not going to do any better. But they sure are pretty.﻿